


Into the shade

by bottledbliss



Category: The Punisher (TV 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, I Don't Even Know, Inspired by Orpheus and Eurydice (Ancient Greek Religion & Lore), Kastle AU, kastle - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-07
Updated: 2019-08-23
Packaged: 2020-04-12 08:40:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 17,327
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19128499
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bottledbliss/pseuds/bottledbliss
Summary: “Where you go, I go. Right, Frank?”“That’s right”.“I don’t leave you, you don’t leave me.”“Sounds like a deal.”





	1. Chapter 1

Some skills never leave you.

This is a fact Karen knows to be true because even though she hasn’t been on a bike in years, she still remembers how to ride one. These things work like a reflex, that’s what she has to focus on because, sure, following somebody’s trail is extremely different than riding a bike and maybe she’s a little bit rusty, but she has no time to second-guess her ability to pull it off. Frank has been missing for three weeks. God only knows what he’s gotten himself into this time. Every moment spent on hesitation lowers the chances of finding him and the chances are pretty damn low already. He hasn’t left her much to work with, nothing concrete. She’s looked all over for him, combed every inch of the city, even visited the terrible dive bars where he liked to hang out when he was pretending those were the only places he could fit in.

After the first hundred calls, his phone battery was probably depleted, but that doesn’t stop her from calling again and again, despite getting his voicemail every time. Deep down, she knows the truth, but she keeps hoping that she’s going to hear his voice, any minute now. ‘Battery ran out, sorry’ he’ll say, and everything’s going to be alright and she’ll be mad at him for not finding a way to contact her sooner and she won’t be crying and the tightness will leave her chest and-

Ringing David Lieberman’s doorbell feels strange and awkward and all around unpleasant. She taps her foot nervously on the front porch, listening to the sounds coming from inside. Kids laughing, music, a woman’s voice shouting something incomprehensible over it. Not for the first time in her life, Karen feels like she’s trespassing. But this guy has scared Frank in the past and anything that can scare Frank is worth looking into. Then Lieberman opens the door. He’s taller than she imagined. And he looks kind, much kinder than she could have expected, as he gives her a quick glance over.   

“Karen Page.” He speaks her name like an old friend. It should be unnerving. It isn’t. “I was wondering if you’d show up.”

“You already knew.”

David blushes and looks down.

“Who is it?” the woman –his wife, Sarah, wasn’t it?- shouts again.

“It’s… uh… Pete’s girlfriend,” he announces.

Girlfriend. The title hasn’t been mentioned out loud until now. Frank probably wouldn’t like it. He has called her a lot of things. A pain in the ass, on rare occasions, honey, darling, sunshine; but never his girlfriend. Karen hears the sound of feet trudging on the floor and three heads suddenly pop around the wall; mother, daughter and son gawking at her, without bothering to hide their amazement. “How can Pete have a girlfriend?” the girl says, eyes as wide as humanly possible, her voice pitching with incredulity. She must be an oddity to them, a mythical creature.

“Leo, that’s rude,” Sarah hisses as she straightens up and goes to stand next to David. “Would you like to come in?”

“Sorry to barge in on you like this,” Karen says. “I won’t be staying though. I was hoping your husband could help me with something real quick.” She nods to the side.

“Yeah, sure.” David closes the door behind him, while the other three pretend all of their interest in Karen has suddenly faded. It’s not very convincing. “The kids aren’t usually this excited about visitors, but I’m sure you can understand why they’d be curious.”

“Not really,” she admits, walking back down the steps as he follows after her.

“Well, Frank being the scary man that he is,” he snorts.

“And scary men can’t be loved?”

David grins playfully at the bite in her tone. “I didn’t say that.”

“I’m sorry, I’m just…” She throws her head back and sighs. Whatever’s happened isn’t his fault. David Lieberman is one of the good guys. David Lieberman cares. “I’m tired and, if I’m being honest, a little bit desperate too.”

“You know, I’ve been keeping tabs on him,” he tells her, crossing his arms on his chest. “I haven’t seen the guy in years, okay? Not in person,” he stammers. “He wanted to stay away, I get that. But I had to look in on him, from time to time.”

Maybe he’s expecting her to scold him or something, give him a lecture about privacy, like any normal person would. But keeping tabs means that he knows something. He must. Impatience grows inside her. She doesn’t need the overture, she just wants to get to the point. “That’s fine,” she nods so quickly that it makes her dizzy. “Whatever you might have taken a peek at doesn’t matter now. My only concern is finding him.” Her heart starts beating a little faster, before her brain registers the look on his face. His blue eyes watering don’t bode well. The sun is still shining, but the sky gets a little darker then. She doesn’t know what to do with his sadness. She has to deal with her own first. _Just don’t tell me that he’s…_ “Tell me where he is.”

“I don’t know,” David croaks. “It’s like he dropped off the face of the earth. The last time he appeared on any feed, he had just bought tickets to Florida. Never used them,” he adds when she opens her mouth to ask that very question. “After that…” His frown is followed by a heavy shrug. “I can’t use the same software I did in the past, I have to keep my head down too. But I ran facial recognition, checked bank account movements, car rentals, phone records, recent arrests.” He pauses to swallow whatever is stuck in his throat. “Anything I could think of, I’ve already tried.”

Laughing through her disbelief, Karen shakes her head. Denial. Stage one. This is bad. “No, people don’t just disappear without a trace.”

“He’s done it before,” he states, reluctantly.

 

_“Where you go, I go. Right, Frank?”_

_“That’s right”._

_“I don’t leave you, you don’t leave me.”_

_“Sounds like a deal.”_

“Before,” Karen stresses. _Before was different. Before wasn’t laced with moments of us. He hadn’t woken up in my bed before, hadn’t kissed me yet_. “But you still managed to find him. Because you’re that good, right?”

“And what does it tell you that I can’t find him now?”

When Curtis told her he didn’t know anything, she wasn’t all that surprised, somehow. But David is supposed to be the one with the answers. They stare at each other for a while, as she tries to make sense of what he’s telling her. Or not telling her. “You’re sure he’s not…”

“What do you expect to hear?” he grunts. “He sure as hell gets shot at enough for us to exclude the possibility. But wouldn’t we have found out by now? ‘The Punisher Dead’ would make an excellent headline.”

Karen starts rubbing her forehead, tries to push away the pressure building there and focus. “Nobody would know. He looked- looks so different.” _He looks soft and happy. And he smiles. He smiles all the time now._ “And the name… His driving license… He was Pete, to everybody else. He-” She clears her throat. “Autopsy records?”

Wearily, he nods, his face turning an unappealing shade of green. “Done that too. There were… There were pictures. I went through all of them. He didn’t show up in any.”

This should make her feel better, but it only makes her think of him rotting in a ditch alone. She keels over slightly, holding her stomach, feeling more and more unsteady on her feet. He’s lived alone for a long time. He shouldn’t have to die alone too.

David grabs her by the elbows and pulls her against him, giving her something to lean on. “Hey, don’t go swooning on me now, okay?” He tries to sound laid-back, calm, and Karen summons a chuckle through the nausea.

“I don’t swoon. But I might be sick on your shoes.”

“Go ahead. It’s not like they’re my favorite.”

Inhaling slowly through her nose, she stands up straight and starts digging in her bag for a business card. “Will you call me if there’s anything new?” She gets frustrated at the jumble of stuff that won’t let her find what she’s looking for. Things, people- they keep getting lost. Why does she keep losing them, even when she’s holding on with both hands?

The corner of his mouth lifts a little. “I have your number. Do you have mine?”

“Text me. Or send me an email, whatever works for you.” She clicks her heel on the walkway. “We’ll be in touch.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I guess I’m going to try Florida,” she mumbles and turns around to leave, eyes on the ground. “If that doesn’t pan out, I don’t know. I’ll figure it out.”

“Hey, Karen?” He shifts from one foot to the other, charmingly boyish. “I could use a hug, before you go,” he says.

What a nice serving of bullshit. He doesn’t need a hug. Not from her. And she’s not one to be soliciting comfort from strangers either. Under different circumstances, she would just keep walking. But she has lost Frank and she’s carrying all this weight inside her chest. Without a word, her arms wrap around his neck.

“It’s going to be okay,” he murmurs softly as he rubs her back, which is exactly what she needed, even if it doesn’t fix anything.

 _How? How do you know and how do I make it okay?_ “Yeah,” is all she manages to choke out. “Thanks.”

What is he going to tell his family when he goes back inside? He can’t tell the children Frank is missing, may be dead, just like that, can he? If he tells them, she’s afraid it might make it true. How is he going to explain this to them, the strange woman showing up at their house, uninvited, and then running away like she’s being hunted? Actually, she hopes he doesn’t tell them anything. Maybe she’ll feel better if everybody else is just as in the dark as she is.

 

 

It’s the same thing everywhere she goes. Never seen him, don’t know him. She has pulled into every other truck stop or gas station on the way, trying to pry information out of strangers who didn’t want to be bothered. If the one picture of Frank she has on her phone was an actual photograph, it would be fraying around the edges from all the hands that have haphazardly reached out and touched it so far.

Karen tries not to look at it herself. It’s etched in her mind anyway. A finger raised in warning not to take the picture, his smile too tender to deter her. God, she hates him. She resents him for ever having looked at her like that, for having come back to her and for not having come back sooner at the same time. And most of all, for leaving her again. For not being there after he promised… She curses him internally while driving on the I-77, and just outside of Charlotte, one wave of profanity after the other starts pouring out; the result of the red heat which has been rising inside her since that shitty travel stop in Lambsburg. She’s been driving for so long and she’s exhausted and- _that asshole promised he would be more careful_.

“I’d never hurt you, Karen,” she speaks out loud, in a mocking, bitter voice, slapping the steering wheel because there’s no one else there to slap, hitting the car horn by accident. “What do you call this? Asshole!” Even the cars driving by piss her off. She yells at them too. Nobody in the world is safe from her wrath.

When did she make it to stage two? She doesn’t want to be moving through stages like this, so fast, like it’s inescapable. There must be something she can do to prevent it from happening. Even if it has already happened. She shakes her shoulders, but the tension refuses to leave them. A low, raspy voice inside her head whispers that maybe it would be smarter to just let it go, simply move on with her life. “Would you have let it go?” she says to the empty space beside her. There’s no answer, of course. He wouldn’t have answered even if he were there, in the flesh. He would have growled and looked out the window, warily submitting to her stubbornness.

By the time she meets Amy, she’s hanging on by a thread. One look at the delighted young woman, who is scanning the area behind her back with enthusiasm, is all it takes to know he’s not here either, hasn’t even stopped by on his way to a different destination. Her hands start shaking, but she can’t let Amy see; she wouldn’t be able to explain why. So she presses her palms on her back when they hug, flat, like the line of her pulse. She wonders how long she can keep it up.

“Where’s Frank?” Amy asks, still beaming.

 _He’s gone_ , Karen thinks, her heart dropping to her feet, dipping into the warm Florida sand and even further down, sinking, sinking, sinking, because the earth is bottomless and so is her grief. “Busy,” she replies, forcing out a smile that hurts her face. “You only get me this time.”

During dinner, she is remarkably quiet but if Amy suspects anything, she has the grace not to prod. And, thankfully, she has a lot to say anyway. She talks about the ocean, her love of it exposed on the table between them, and Karen lets the undulation of her voice carry her away for a while. When they say goodbye, it feels like a string snapping, two pieces separated from each other, never to touch again. Karen pulls a strand of Amy’s hair, rough with salt, and twirls it between her fingers. “See you soon,” she says, because ‘soon’ can mean a lot of things.

“Bring Frank with you next time. I’m starting to forget what his face looks like.” Amy gives a watery laugh. “Not the worst thing that could happen to a person, but still.”

“Next time, for sure,” Karen nods, feeling like a lying sack of crap, on top of everything else.

What’s the plan? Where does she go from here? What trail does she follow now that all of them have gone cold? She gets in her car, starts driving aimlessly down unfamiliar streets. Find a motel, get some sleep, she advises herself. An hour and a half later, she’s caught in a staring contest with the ceiling of a cheap room, dim lights and the vague smell of something burnt completing the shabby setting. There’s a pain in her gut, too vicious for tears. The bed frame squeaks when she tries to move. It reminds her of her own bed squeaking, Frank gasping her name, the stone and the silk of his voice, his weight on her, and she’s suddenly gasping for breath under the weight his absence has left.

The person in the next room roars with laughter at something he’s watching on TV. It’s strange, hearing someone laugh so hard right now. Almost as if it’s a day like any other and life goes on. For the tiniest moment, Karen wonders if she could do the same. Go on, go home, keep going. But that would mean—

Acceptance. Accept that Frank is dead and gone and that she’s never going to see him again. Which leaves her with two options.

The first and somehow least crazy one, is try to smoke out whoever took Frank from her and tear them apart, blow them to pieces. She knows she has it in her to do that and worse, so much worse; but she doesn’t want to. It wouldn’t bring him back anyway. There’s no way, _no way in hell_ she’s going to settle for that.

A bead of sweat runs down her forehead as she considers the second option. It’s utterly ridiculous and absolutely mad. It requires believing in things that she’s never believed in, kicking down the partition between the possible and the impossible. Yeah, well, the definition of impossible has changed a lot over the years, hasn’t it? Even if the definition of insanity hasn’t. What would Frank have to say about this? Wanting to consult your dead boyfriend over an important decision doesn’t exactly scream compos mentis. She has just about enough clarity of mind to think of calling David, doesn’t even check what time it is before doing it.

His voice is clear and alert when he answers. “Karen, what happened?”

“Florida… didn’t pan out after all.” She runs a hand through her hair and tries to slow her breathing. She won’t be able to get a word out otherwise.

“I’m sorry,” he sniffles and his voice quivers with concern. “Are you okay?”

“I need…” she mumbles, before a sob leaps out of her throat, cutting her off.

“Anything, anything you want,” he says and, in that moment, he means it.

“I need…” Karen swallows down another sob and presses on. “I need you to locate someone for me.”

“Yeah, of course. Who are we looking for?”

“The lady in red,” she tells him, calmly this time, voice steady. “I have to talk to her.”

David falls silent. If it wasn’t for the sound of his breath shaking on the other end of the line, she might have thought he dropped dead at her words.

“You’re crazy,” he says after a few moments.

“Probably. Does that mean you’re not going to do it?”

“No, I’m going to do it.” David laughs. “You goddamn nutcase, I’m going to do it.”

 

 

Even though she’s not in one of the most secluded areas of Central Park, people don’t seem to approach the Scarlet Witch or cast her curious looks as she sits quietly in a bench. Maybe nobody finds the sighting unusual anymore. David said she spends some of her free time in that spot- and another, quieter one, but he wanted something a bit more public for their meeting. Fewer chances of getting obliterated when there are people watching. Approach with caution, David also said. And she should be cautious, but Wanda is as still as a statue when this perfect stranger sits down next to her, humming to get her attention. She doesn’t even blink, staring at a rabble of butterflies flitting about together in front of her in total silence. There’s nothing about her that suggests hostility and Karen can’t bring herself to feel afraid.

“They’re very pretty,” she says.

“Thanks, I made them myself,” Wanda replies and when she turns to look at Karen, she lets three or four butterflies blip out of existence, just to illustrate a point, while the rest continue their colorful dance. “I’m glad you’re not late. I have other places to be soon.”

“Were you expecting me?” She has to remind herself that she’s in 21st century New York, talking to a witch. Anything goes. There shouldn’t be any trace of surprise in her voice.

“The ground tracks all of our steps,” Wanda explains. “I didn’t know you, specifically, were coming, but I was told someone was.”

“You’re talking about actual magic.”

“Until you have a better name for it.”

“If our meeting was foretold, does it mean you have to help me?”

Wanda’s gaze fixes on her. “I don’t have to do anything.”

Karen notices the light flickering deep inside her eyes, an ancient spirit that never sleeps. All the power smoldering in this woman’s veins and she’s the very image of tranquility, while holding Karen’s heart in her hand, deliberating whether she should crush it or not.   

“How honest should I be?” she asks finally.

“Don’t hold anything back,” Karen replies with a pained smile, hoping she won’t come to regret her words, at the same time knowing that she will.

Wanda nods slowly, looks like she’s picking out notes from the depths of her mind. “I see a lot of blood, not all of it his. He didn’t go down without a fight. Gave them hell.”

Karen’s chuckle comes out dry, despite the moisture collecting in her eyes. “Yeah, that’s my man alright.”

Whatever force she’s hooked up to in order to get this information, must come with some backlash. Her chest rises with effort and falls with heavy exhales. “He couldn’t really fight back after they slit his throat. He was bleeding too much by then. But he got two of them. They fell before he did. The third one will get what’s coming to him very shortly.” Then, her consciousness slowly returns to the present and she draws in a long breath. “I can tell you where to find the body. What is left of it at least.”

She’s just stating facts. There’s no sting in her voice, no intent to hurt, but Jesus fuck, does it.

“No.” Karen squeezes her eyes shut for a few seconds, trying to block out the noise of life that goes on around her. _It goes on, damn it_. “No, that’s not what I want,” she gulps. Buried things don’t really come back. She doesn’t want to bury what’s left of Frank. _How little? How little is left? Should I ask?_ “I’m not interested in a locating spell,” she mutters and catches Wanda’s grimace from the corner of her eye.

“You were hoping for a retrieving one.” Her serene appearance breaks down completely. “You have no idea what you’d have to go through to bring him back. Did you think it would be easy?”

“Sure, it’s going to be a piece of cake,” she groans, blinking back a tear or two. “Compared to the alternative. But you’re saying it can be done. You’ve tried it before.”

“Once.”

“And did it work?” Karen insists.

The butterflies dissipate into a red mist retreating back to Wanda’s fingertips. “Not for me. What I was looking for wasn’t there.”

“I’m sorry,” she says. People think meeting others who have experienced loss as well helps you cope with yours. Karen finds that it doesn’t. “Look, you don’t know me and you have no reason to-”

“No, I don’t know you,” Wanda interrupts and her penetrating gaze lands on Karen’s face again, making the hair on the back of her neck prickle. “But I see you. I see the wolf in you licking its teeth.” She tilts her head, eyes blazing. “Going through life with this kind of hunger inside you is exhausting. So, from one wolf to another, I hope you get your heart’s desire.” Then she leans back, delicate and tender, not looking like a force of nature at all. Just a woman, sitting in a bench in Central Park, with her hands crossed on her lap. No butterflies to look at.

“What is the ground telling you now?” Karen asks, feeling a bit silly.

Wanda puffs out a short laugh. “It’s telling me you have to go get some rest and eat something. I can’t send you to the underworld like this. You don’t have any powers to help you. The least you could do is go in with a full stomach.” There is something strangely motherly about her instructions. Karen wonders if she’s going to suggest she puts on a jacket next. “You’re too pale,” Wanda continues.

“I’m always pale,” Karen smirks. “It has nothing to do with my diet.”

“No, I mean in my vision. You’re too pale,” she says again. “White as snow.”

“Does that mean I’m going to die?” The possibility has crossed her mind before coming here. She’s made her peace with it already.

“There are worse things than dying down there,” Wanda informs her, waiting to see if the warning will make the stubborn blonde change her mind.

Frank would be furious right about now. He’d be yelling at her, barking like a mad dog. _Don’t do it, Karen. Walk away. If something happens to you…_ If only he were there to yell at her in person, she might listen. But he isn’t. And there’s nothing worse than that.

_Where you go, I go. Right, Frank? Wasn’t that the deal?_

“It’s okay,” Karen nods. “It’s going to be okay.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaall the thanks to [heidiamalia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/heidiamalia/pseuds/heidiamalia) for reading this and basically fluffing my ego enough to release this chapter into the wild! And for also allowing me to write a subtle nod to her brilliant fic [The Blood In The Blue](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18394358/chapters/43562066). Enjoy and let me know what you think!

“There’s something bothering me,” Wanda says and then rolls her eyes so far back into her skull, she ends up looking possessed. “I’m not wasting energy on trying to displace an object that, I know for a fact, won’t make it through with you.” There’s no use trying to lie to this woman. Karen places the gun in Wanda’s open palm, watching it immediately disappear in front of her eyes. “It wouldn’t do you any good, trust me.”

“Kinda feel naked without it,” she grumbles.  

“Do you want me to tell you what happens in the life where you do take it with you?” Wanda asks and turns to face west, busy eyes scanning the horizon. “I can see that because it has already happened.”

Karen can’t help how high her brow arches. “There’s…” she trails off. _Another life? A different one?_

“Well, different reality,” Wanda says, with the calm and patience of a kindergarten teacher. “Didn’t you know? There are so many.”

And Frank still dies and she tries to save him. “How many?”

“More than I can count.”

“In how many of them does he manage not to get killed?”

“Apart from the one in which he’s a monk,” Wanda hides her smirk just in time, “he’s exceptionally undying in most of them.”

_Of all the crazy things to say…_ Karen chokes on her own breath, forgetting for a moment that he was exceptionally undying in this life too. Until he wasn’t. “A monk? Frank? There’s a reality in which Frank Castle is an actual monk?”

“A pacifist, no less. And that is one of the more normal ones,” she replies. “There’s one where he…” She hesitates. “There’s no easy way to say this. He gets infected with a kind of virus that he passes on to me. By biting me.”

First a monk and now— _Why is anything surprising anymore?_ “You’re saying he is, was a z-”

Wanda cuts her off. “It isn’t a word I’m comfortable using.” She wraps her arms around herself, looks down. “I don’t like him so much in that reality, as you can imagine.”

“Of course. Why would you?” Karen nods, matching her serious expression, like this is just an average conversation and there’s been no mention of zombies. “What happens in the life where I do take my gun with me?”

“You rely on it to save you,” she says. “It doesn’t.”

She stares down at her boots, courtesy of Frank. For hiking, he’d said, but they never went hiking. Never got around to it. “Is this all we do? Try to save each other and fail, over and over?” _What’s the point of multiple realities, if we can’t catch a break?_ “Don’t we ever get to just… be?” she sniffles.

“Of course. Not all realities are so grim.” A tiny flicker of hope to crush despair. “There’s even one where you’re a mermaid,” she adds, intentionally failing to mention the pain that specific reality came with.

“Now you’re just messing with me,” Karen mutters, trying to keep her mouth from smiling as she rubs the tip of her nose.

“Perhaps,” Wanda replies with a naughty shine in her eyes that makes Karen want to believe in fairy tales. “Are you ready now?”

Shouldn’t it be special, this moment? Faint tints of yellow and orange across the sky as the sun descends lazily to meet the Hudson. It might be the last sunset she ever sees. It doesn’t feel special though. It feels like looking at a postcard of a sunset, the words ‘wish you were here’ scribbled on the back with a heavy hand. Against her better judgment, an unfathomable image takes shape in Karen’s mind; her mermaid tail wrapped around Frank’s leg, a soft moon lending its beams to illuminate the odd embrace. Would he be smiling there too or would the absurdity of the situation be too much for a practical man like him? No reality could ever be quite as idyllic, could it? But the vision persists. _Look at you._ If he’d run as fast as he could on land, he wouldn’t think twice before splitting the waves to get to her. _Deep blue fish tail or pale pink legs, I can make you smile anywhere. You’ll be smiling here again soon._

“Thank you,” Karen says, taking a deep breath.

“You’re welcome,” Wanda gives her a little grin and then starts swirling her forefinger in the air.

A wisp of red smoke flows out of Wanda’s fingertip, coiling into a tiny sphere that she then spins between her palms, like a ball of yarn, before sending it flying a few feet in front of them. There it stretches and expands, until it’s so large a truck could fit through it. Karen squints, trying to discern what’s on the other side. It’s too dark to be able to make out any details. A quiver of unease makes her stomach flip. It’s not like she was expecting a green meadow with birds singing in the trees, but this is ridiculous. _I should be able to see something_ , she thinks, already moving towards it. “Remember the rules?” Wanda’s voice sounds distant.

“We’ve gone over everything a thousand times,” Karen confirms with a distracted nod, reaching out a hand into the darkness. Nothing reaches back for her. She puts one foot through, cautiously testing the ground. It seems even and solid. “No food, no drink. I remember.” Wanda asks another muffled question. She’s too far away now, miles and miles away-- above, while Karen is lowering herself into the earth. When she turns back to take one last look at her, Wanda is trembling with the strain keeping the portal open is causing her, sweat glistening on her forehead. Karen is suddenly afraid this might break her, so she promptly raises her other foot to cross the threshold, only now noticing the membrane rippling between the two worlds. Was it there before? If it wobbles when she pushes through it, it’s hardly noticeable.

“Can you repeat the incantation for me one more time?” Wanda shouts, a faraway echo.

“I remember everything,” Karen shouts back, hoping that she can be heard clearly over the barrier. “Let go now!”

Wanda casts a concerned look in her direction and as her hands fall to her sides, the living world Karen was a part of until now starts dimming. The red glow of the portal fizzles away, the opening shrinking and shrinking, before disappearing completely with a small whir. Karen blinks, once, twice and then, she doubles over and heaves, trying her best to keep the contents of her stomach where they belong.

 

Her eyes get used to the darkness quickly, because there’s not much darkness to speak of. It’s just that the light is so pale that it was imperceptible against the brightness of New York City. She can’t locate its source, but it’s enough to know that it exists, for now. She’s alone, that’s what bothers her the most. All signs of life vanished as soon as the portal closed. There weren’t supposed be any souls there anyway. Not yet. Water is dripping somewhere in the distance, an astoundingly earthly sound; she follows it like a compass.

Wanda has told her there’s no real way to prepare for what she’s going to encounter here. It’s different for each person, depending which way you’ll end up going, which means she might even find herself smack dab in the middle of the Elysian Fields. Wouldn’t that be nice? Find Frank with a bottle of wine in his hand, a wreath of laurels on his head- a wonderfully quaint mosaic of an afterlife. Her palm flush against the damp wall, she laughs out loud and her laughter unfolds into the blind tunnel in front of her, reaches so far that it doesn’t sound like it ever belonged to her.

The dripping sound becomes louder with each step she takes. It’s also becoming more frequent, like a leaky tap that won’t shut up while you’re trying to sleep the night before an important meeting. It’s irritating but if it went away, she’d have to start talking to herself just to shatter the silence. Or scream. One or the other. The ground slants up and then down, a few loose stones roll under her boots and Karen loses her balance, letting out a muffled swear; the constant drip-drip-drip cuts off. Then it begins again. Fear wriggles between her ribs but whatever’s at the end of the tunnel, she’d hate to keep it waiting.

Finally, the passage widens into a plateau, a large door mounted on the wall on the far side ahead of her. The lintel above it is carved with the phases of the moon. Maybe that’s why it seems to emanate a light of its own, dashes of silver reflecting off of the rocky surroundings. She’s not mesmerized by it, she’s really not, it’s not even that beautiful, it’s strange and a bit corny, and she’s only gliding towards it because she’s weary and there’s a door right there and it must lead somewhere. _It must lead to him_. A huge paw slams down in front of her.

It’s not that the dog is gigantic. It’s hardly bigger than an elephant. And, sure, dogs aren’t supposed to be that big, but they’re also not supposed to have three heads, three intelligent sets of eyes gazing down, waiting for her to make her move. The head in the middle has its mouth slightly open; saliva gathers at its corner and then, drip drip drips and splashes onto the ground, echoing throughout the chamber. Its teeth shine like pearls, clean and pure, but they must have been stained with blood at one point or another. _Do spirits bleed?_ Well, she does. And she’d like to avoid it.

Karen and the strange animal stand there, appraising each other. She slowly raises her hand to point at the door. “I need to go in there,” she says, hoping that the dog understands. If it does, it disagrees with her, awkwardly shifting its weight to sit down right in front of the door and blocking all access to it. “It’s really important,” she moves towards it. “Someone’s waiting for me and-”

The middle head lunges forward, its thick snout stopping inches away from her face and she freezes, stops breathing while the other two sniff her up and down, their combined breath hitting her like a heatwave. Then all three snort in unison, as if to say _nobody’s waiting for you_. “Please,” she tries again. Three heads turn away from her in the most insulting display of derision. It’s unfair that her journey should end before it even began, before she’s had the chance to at least try to save Frank, who would do anything to save her. Short of, maybe, hurting a dog. How would she manage to hurt it anyway? This supersized pooch might as well be a boulder towering over her, and she has come here armed with her bare hands.

“Always be kind to dogs, right? Even three-headed ones,” Karen says under her breath. Six ears perk up at this, all three curious heads tilting to the side. As she wilts to the ground, Karen intends to laugh in the face of hopelessness, and yet, she ends up crying. She hasn’t cried this way in ages, heaving each sob out like they were stones stuck in her lungs.

A sharp whine fills the expanse around her. Without making the tiniest sound, the dog has crawled to her, its heads resting next to her leg as it stares at her with remorse. Wiping her face with one hand, she picks a head to pat at random with the other. “It’s not your fault, I get it,” she says, marveling at how small her hand looks in the space between the dog’s ears. “You’re just doing your job.” She could befriend the beast, convince it to let her through. If only she had more time.

The dog rises, its right head nudging her shoulder as gently as it can, and goes to lie down between her and the door. She sighs and the dog sighs back, and she can’t think of anything funnier or more heartbreaking. She gets up and starts pacing. Every time she glances at the dog, she sees its eyes following any motion she makes. Maybe she could reach the door, if she waited for it to fall asleep. But does it sleep?

After a lot of pacing, and huffing and groaning, she deduces that it doesn’t. It hasn’t even yawned once. She visualizes a possible course; running to the left, praying that the dog will come after her so she can swerve right at the last second, maybe roll under it if it comes too close. She imagines her fingers gripping that contemptuously glistening doorknob and turning it. It’s crazy, but crazier plans have worked. That’s how she got here in the first place. The dog’s eyes –all of them- meet hers. A chill runs down her spine. And then, the door creaks open.

A man, or the spirit of a man, steps through, letting out a tiny gasp as the dog’s right head turns to snarl at him, long canines bared. The man looks to Karen with glassy eyes pleading for help, but she’s too busy grinning at the other two heads, that seem a little bit uncertain about what to do next. She shouldn’t feel bad. It’s not like she’d be killing him with her own hands; the man is already dead. _But so is Frank._ But Frank is important and that man is nothing but her ticket into the depths of hell. _I’m coming for you_. “You can’t get both of us, buddy,” she tells the dog as the man races away, looking over his shoulder. “You’re not going to let him escape, are you?” she says again. A final moment of hesitation, then the dog darts after the fugitive and Karen runs for the gate. Spirits scream and it’s worse than she could ever imagine, desperate shrieks merged with the thunder that is the dog’s growling. _It doesn’t matter. He could have been the worst person that ever lived, for all I know. It doesn’t matter_. By the time she pulls the heavy door shut behind her, she’s almost persuaded herself it’s true. 

 

Extremely grateful for the restored silence, Karen takes a moment to catch her breath. Her throat is dry, her stomach twisting in knots. _Get yourself together, there’s still a long way to go_. And the long way forward is strewn with sinkholes, cinders flying out of them, lighting an otherwise dark path. “Fun,” she mumbles, carefully moving between them. “I’m having so much fun right now.”

“Well, I can’t allow that.”

She can’t help jumping at the voice and this specific terrain isn’t suitable for jumping. With her back pressed against the wall to avoid tripping and falling into one of the holes, she keeps moving. “You’re wasting your time,” she chuckles, savoring the bitterness that rolls off her tongue. It makes perfect sense that the last person she’d want to see is the first person she meets here, decked in his crisp suit. Across the fabric of his white shirt, the blood blossoms as vibrant as the day she spilled it.

“It’s not easy to waste something of which you have incalculable amounts,” Wesley scoffs, trailing behind her. “Being dead tends to clear one’s schedule.”

“Can you be dead somewhere else?” Her laughter is proof that his words haven’t made the desired impact and for an instant, he seems confounded. “Were you expecting me to break down when I saw you? The guilt over your death-”

“Murder.”

“-doesn’t haunt me anymore.”

“It was murder.”

All of a sudden, her hands feel sticky and clammy. She looks down to find them covered with blood. It’s a trick, a goddamn illusion. _My hands are clean. My hands are clean._ “I got over it.” She reaches over and wipes her palms on his jacket, before turning her back to him once more. “So you’re really just background noise. And I’m in the middle of something here.”

“Yes, I can see that.” He pauses to clean his glasses, letting her put some distance between them while he inspects the crater she’s just crossed. “You have such a talent for picking lost causes. Maybe because you enjoy failure.”

“Failure implies giving up,” she grunts as she skims over one of the smaller holes. Something moves down there. Not flame and smoke, but something aflame and steaming.

“Why shouldn’t you give up on somebody who has given up on you?”

The question makes her ears buzz. Her gravity shifts, one foot hovering carelessly above the chasm. Wesley has a lopsided grin on his face. Death hasn’t changed him; he’s still the same obnoxious bastard. “Frank Castle has been reunited with his family. He’s finally happy. But you can’t let it be, can you? Because he never thinks about you, not even a little bit, and you can’t stand that. How long will it take you to realize that you are the real villain here?”

If Frank is happy, she isn’t going to force him to come back. _That’s good, isn’t it? If Frank is happy…_ “I’ll believe it when I see it with my own eyes,” she spits through her clenched throat and pushes forward, as the ground rumbles faintly beneath her feet.

“In that case, I suppose you’ll need a guide.”

“You?” she snorts and he hums a sound like static. Out of the fog, a slender arch becomes visible up ahead. She doesn’t want him there when she goes through it. “If I ask nicely, will you go away?”

“You want me to leave?” He narrows his eyes in her direction.

“Please, don’t tell me you’re offended.” A long flame spurts out of the trench to her side, making her sweat. “Jesus… Look, your sole purpose was to guilt-trip me or something, and it’s obviously not working. So why don’t you just resume what you were doing before I showed up and I won’t tell anyone what a poor job you did at haunting me?”

“Miss Page,” he snickers and pinches his nose. “That wasn’t my sole purpose. Although, I must admit, I would have enjoyed seeing you beg for forgiveness.”

A roar rises slowly from the earth, accompanied by distant moaning. “What did you do?”

“Me? I didn’t do anything. I just wanted to see a living person from up close. As do they.” He gestures to the hot ashes gushing out of the craters and the dark mass stirring beneath. “Very well then. You want me gone, I’m gone. I should advise you, however, to try and be nicer to the dead, since you may be joining our ranks soon,” he drawls, mocking her openly now. Then he shakes his head and looks at her over his glasses with eyes glazed by death. “I’d say ‘see you in hell’, but we have already done that.” And without any further delay, carried away by a subtle breeze, he vanishes.  

A hand wraps around Karen’s ankle and tugs her down so hard that her head bounces on the ground when she falls. Everything slows, even sound, her groans mixed with _theirs_ , the hundreds of tortured souls reaching out of the crevices to grab her. Her leg thrashing, she digs her fingers into the dirt, tries to get free, but the grip on her ankle is rigid and scalding, blistering her skin. She twists her torso around to look at the creature clinging to her. There’s nothing human about its ashen face, the agonized O of its mouth. It must have been human once but all that remains of its nature is the hunger, flaring in the coal of its sunken eyes. More follow; more harrowed faces, not one of them familiar, more hands clambering out of the sinkholes around her, crying their infernal lament.

The sole of her boot meets the creature’s face, weakly at first, and as the dizziness leaves her, kicking turns into a vicious bashing. The hand slackens but stays close as she crawls off. Another’s fingers get tangled in her hair. Karen yanks her head away. Her scalp stings, her lungs sting, everything stings by this point. Their wails rise steadily, curdling around her. Wherever she looks, there are hordes of the dead, dragging her down every time she tries to stand up, touches that burn, that will burn more than her skin if she lets them hold on for too long.

“Come on, get up!” Somebody else’s hand, cool and soothing and so soft, grabs her forearm and jerks her up to her feet. She’s too concerned about the net of arms she has to avoid while skipping away from danger to notice who her savior is, but she must remember to thank them later. _That was too close, too goddamn close_. Still shaking, she’s shoved into a hatch, hears a key turning in a lock, the fluorescent lighting of the room making little sparks dance in her vision.

“There were too many for you to fight,” a woman tells her. Her voice, her voice is something out of a dream, the crackling of a warm fire on a snowy evening, a lullaby. “But you’re safe in here, don’t worry.”

“M-mom?”

Penny -the tag on her chest reads clearly- comes to stand in front of her, wiping sweat off her forehead and, Karen suspects, a bit of blood too. “You’re safe now, baby,” she coos and even though her daughter knows there’s a lot more peril waiting, she’s willing to believe it’s all going to be smooth sailing from now on. Because her mom said so. Gasping with relief, gasping for air, Karen falls into her arms. Her mother pats her on the back.

“What are you doing here?” Karen stammers.

“What am _I_ doing here? What are _you_ doing here?” she giggles and scuttles away, quickly returning with a damp towel to clean the soot gathered on her daughter’s face; a job she has to perform with one hand, seeing as Karen won’t let go of the other. “You’re a long, long way from home.” She points to a chair. “Sit down.” Karen complies without a word and she sits opposite her.

The gentle friction of the towel against her skin makes her eyes want to flutter closed, but she won’t be able to look at her mother if she lets it happen. Just like in the photos, she’s smiling and she’s beautiful and perfect, and Karen is all out of tears to shed and, God, how she regrets that. When the cloth grazes a cut by her lip, she hisses and then chuckles. “It’s okay, mom.” She strokes her healthy, rosy cheek. “It honestly doesn’t hurt that much.”

“All this for a guy, Karen?” her mother asks with a soft frown at the corners of her lips.

“Not just any guy,” she replies, like they’re just sitting in their kitchen at home; talking about boys with her mom. Her dead mom.

Her frown deepens. “Of course, not just any guy. A rotten apple. A sinner.”

Somehow, it always comes down to sin. How its mark spreads over a person’s heart, darkening it. Spoiling it. As if it’s that simple; light and dark, black and white, a yes or no answer- as easy as pie. “He is what he is,” Karen says.

Her mother crosses her hands on her lap, sighing. “You’re determined to save him.”

“You’re goddamn right, I am,” she confirms, chin raised high.

“There’s no point in trying to stop you.” Her smile is kind, if a little disappointed, as she stands up and heads for the counter. “At least let me make you something to eat before you go. You must be starving. Eggs, just how you like them?”

“No, mom. I can’t eat anything.” The loud growl of her stomach says otherwise.

“You never could eat when you were stressed. See? I remember,” she laughs and grabs an empty glass from the cabinet, filling it from the tap.

“Just sit back down and talk to me. I don’t need anything else.”

“Here, have some water. It’s going to make you feel better,” she asserts, pushing the glass in her face.

The liquid sloshes about in the glass, her throat clamping up at the way it sparkles. “What’s wrong with you? You know I can’t drink that. You…” _It was too good to be true anyway_. “You’re not my mom.”

“What are you talking about?” she laughs again, louder.

“If I drink that thing, I’ll have to stay here forever.” She stands up from her chair, looking for a way out. “My mother wouldn’t want me to stay. She’d be showing me the exit right now.”

“There’s no exit, baby,” she retorts.

“Stop calling me that,” Karen huffs while she battles the locked door, which refuses to open for her.

After setting the glass on the table, where it stands only to kindle Karen’s thirst, the woman grabs her by the shoulders and spins her around. “The only way out is to go further in,” she glowers. “Do you really want to do that? You’ve seen what’s on the other side of that door. What I’m offering is better. There would be no pain, no fiends trying to devour your soul. You just take a little sip and all your troubles will be over.”

“If I did, would I ever see Frank again?” It’s not the dark mark in her heart yearning for his, sinner turning to sinner for comfort. It’s every inch of hers, from the roots of her hair right down to the marrow of her bones, aching, howling _give me back what’s mine. Where you go, I go. If it’s hell, then we burn together_.

“Of course not.”

Karen nods. “Let me out.”

“In. Further in,” she says, leading her to the back of the kitchen, towards the pantry.

“No food, no drink,” she repeats Wanda’s vehement instructions. “I’m not falling for it.”

“There’s no food in there,” the woman informs her, her mother’s voice replaced by another, deeper one and not nearly as kind. “You have to go through Melinoe, if you want to get to your boyfriend.” That word again. He’s so much more than that, her rotten apple, her little gem. “This is the fastest way.” Judging by her tone, the fastest way won’t be smoothest. It’s fine, she has a vague idea of what to expect, so when the woman opens the door, showing her into the narrow den, Karen doesn’t hesitate to go inside.

“I really miss my mom,” she tells the imp dressed in her skin.

“She knows.”

It’s the last thing she hears before she’s drenched in darkness; the last crumb of kindness this place has to spare. She’s not getting any more. Karen blinks—

 

When she opens her eyes again, she’s sitting in a car, hands taut on the wheel while driving down a dark road. “Are we there yet?” she laughs to take the edge off, until she notices the windshield, spattered with grime that the wipers couldn’t remove. A wheeze comes from the passenger’s side. This is punishment. This is what burning alive must feel like. An excruciating pain throbs in her head and she begins convulsing. “Kevin?”

“Watch out!”

The waterfall of broken glass cascading around her doesn’t drown out the booming clang of metal as the car overturns and flips across the road. Suspended upside down in her seat, Karen reaches for her brother’s lifeless body, her fingers barely brushing his jacket. His name slashes out of her throat and she can’t stop shouting it, even if she knows he won’t answer, because he’s dead, he’s dead and she killed him and his blood will always be on her hands. “Kevin, please…” she can’t help trying again, can’t help hoping for that tiny speck of forgiveness that never comes.

Lights and sirens approach. They’re going to pull her out of the wreck, wrap her in a blanket. _Let them_. She’s going to be warm and safe and alive, to hear her dad cry. And she will cover her ears and start her mourning; and she will never stop.

Hands on the wheel again, the engine whining, Kevin panting. This time, she puts one hand on his shoulder and squeezes. Her eyes don’t leave the road. Maybe if she’s careful enough, she can save him. “You know I love you, right?” she sniffles, unblinking.

“I love you too,” Kevin tells her. “That’s why I did this. I already lost mom. I can’t lose you too.”

“I’m taking you to the hospital. Everything is going to be okay.” She glances at him, only for a second, and the car is already tumbling, glass shattering and chiming, Karen shrieking. _Kevin, Kevin, Kevin_ …  

And again.

And again.

And again.

It happens so many times, she’s beginning to lose count. The worst day of her life on an endless loop, scraping away bits of her sanity. And the funny thing is she could have stopped it anytime. It’s like poking a bruise; you shouldn’t do it, because it will hurt and yet… How much pain is enough? The accident will happen no matter what she does, so she lets go of the wheel completely. “I’m so sorry, Kevin. I’m so sorry…” She killed her brother. There’s no changing that. But she can’t go on killing him over and over.

“Watch out!”

Suspended upside down in her seat, beyond exhausted, glass fragments pressing into her palms, Karen shuts her eyes and recites the incantation, prays the nightmare away. “Queen below the earth, banish the maddening stings of the soul to the ends of the earth. Show a kind face,” she whispers, taking a final look at her brother. “Please, please, please, show me a kind face.”

The face observing her when she’s back upright isn’t kind, but it’s not unkind either, just curious. It belongs to a dainty woman, glowing like a small moon as she floats on an invisible current of wind. “You know the hymns of old,” she says with an ancient voice and a smile full of teeth, sharp like tiny blades. “Who taught you?”

“A witch,” Karen mutters, retrieving her breath from the depths of her chest and trying very hard not to offend the terrifying deity by looking away.

“Ah,” she nods. “I like witches. They know how to worship.”

From what she knows of Wanda, Karen can’t imagine her worshipping anyone or anything. But she says “I suppose they do”.

“You’re not a witch.” She leans closer and cackles. “But you smell like one.”

“I smell like sweat and blood,” Karen counters and the goddess’s smile widens.

“Yes.” She peers down at her with her large eyes, a lingering, lucid gaze feasting on every single nightmare Karen has ever had, and inhales deeply, satisfied. “Child, you are mangled.”

Karen shrugs. “I’d say I’m alright, all things considered.”

The goddess glides down, her feet light on the ground which seems to be shivering on contact, and stands impossibly still in front of Karen. “Would you like a gift?”

“S-sure, gifts are nice,” she says, but cowers back.

“There is no need for fear,” she trills. “No, you fight that well enough on your own. I will give you something most mortals can only dream of.”

_I just want Frank._ “Whatever you have in mind sounds too fancy and I don’t mean to sound ungrateful, but there’s only one thing I want.”

“Oblivion.”

“What? No, I don’t want oblivion,” she mumbles.

A glowing palm rises up to Karen’s face, blinding her to the fingers dangerously close to her forehead, on the verge of touching it. She draws back, slinks down to elude the touch. But it persists, she can feel the heat of it on her face. _Why must everything burn down here?_ “Please, no!” she implores as a fingertip sweeps across her hairline. “I won’t be able to find him if I forget! I don’t want to forget! Please, I don’t want t-”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Approved by [heidiamalia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/heidiamalia/pseuds/heidiamalia), whose help is GREATLY APPRECIATED, here is the final chapter. I hope you like it!

Her mind is flying about in a world where there is a blue sky with a sun in it, where the air isn’t stuffy and hard to breathe, even when it is. Voices are arguing close by, quietly but passionately, in a language she doesn’t understand. One is rough; a man obviously used to giving orders and not expecting opposition- when a sharp laugh opposes him. The ground starts rattling. Opening her eyes a crack, Karen tries to crawl away despite the lumbering weakness of her limbs. A few more mystifying words and then, with a thick accent, he says “A gift unwanted is not a gift.” For her benefit, she assumes, because she happens to agree. Curious, she looks over her shoulder.

A drop of light dances in the air, floats slowly in her direction.

Through the blurriness of her vision, it looks like a firefly, and she reaches up to touch it with a lithe finger. She feels the singe before it even comes into contact with her skin. Then, it begins to throb and shimmer, swelling violently as the roar of fire assaults her ears. Karen shuts her eyes tight and turns away from the burst of light that explodes and sends sparks flying all around her.  “I shouldn’t be here,” she mumbles to herself.

“Is that thought your own or did someone plant it in your mind?” says the rough voice, its tone suddenly warm-hearted and pleasant.

“I don’t know,” she says, fingers searching blindly for something to hold on to. Her voice is thin and scratchy with thirst.

“I think you do,” he says.

When she feels the gentle pressure of his hand on hers, her eyes snap open. She realizes the fire is gone, there are no floating lights, only a void that pulses in rhythm with her heart. Her attention is drawn to the warmth of the dark eyes looking back at her, the strong arms pulling her up from the ground while she does her best to keep her knees from buckling. She squints at him, her eyes tracing the lines of his face. “I was looking— looking for something.”

“The living don’t come here often.” Laughter, gleeful and bubbly and high-pitched. It sounds wrong, coming out of this mouth. “You caused quite a commotion.”

She tries to wipe the fuzz off his shape, but it doesn’t budge as her fingers go through it and she squints even more, so much that it hurts her brain. Her head is heavy, her thoughts must be steered a certain way, a certain _elsewhere_ , if she can ever hope to find—

“What is it?” He takes her hand and places a kiss in the middle of her palm, cold prickling against her warm skin.

No kiss should feel like this. It should be warmth against warmth, burrowing in her bones to take away the sting of a long winter, to take— _Taken, taken from me. This face…_ She knows this face. But the one wearing it is a stranger. “This isn’t what you look like normally.”

“You don’t want to see what I look like normally,” he smiles. The corners of his eyes crinkle and Karen feels like scratching them out.

 _It’s not right_ , she thinks _. It’s not right, this smile, this face doesn’t belong to you. You need to put it back_. A dark blur is prowling around the perimeter of her consciousness, asking, begging… _What do you want?_ Her stomach turns and cramps up. Dark things should be kept at bay and she wants to let it in.

“I am told remembering hurts,” the other dark thing in front of her offers a warning.

It does, until you find something to soothe the pain. “Where…” The blur, rattling like thunder, begins to take shape. “Where’s Frank?”

Instead of answering, he stares at her with an expression of marvel and astonishment. “Wonderful,” he whispers. “Almost two days in Melinoe’s pit and you made it out with your sanity intact.”

“Please, stop,” she says when he drags a long finger down the side of her face. Skins aren’t like coats you get from the lost and found and he’s fitting in Frank’s skin so easily that it makes her blood run cold.

“I wish I could give you time with your brother,” his finger stays on her cheek a little while longer. “But I can’t give you what I don’t have.”

Karen grits her teeth. “Don’t you dare talk to me about that, you-”

“What did I have to do with it? I wasn’t even there.” His shadow looms strangely large and menacing in this limitless space. It’s easy to forget how powerful he really is while he’s in the disguise of a mortal. He could probably erase her from existence in the blink of an eye. “You chose to climb a mountain and now you’re blaming me for the scrapes on your hands. You are treading the line between bravery and stupidity and if I were in your place, I’d be very careful in choosing where to land.” Frank has never— could never sound like this.

The grin she flashes him hopefully looks more like an apology than it feels. “I’ll land wherever is closest to Frank.” Anger slips out of his mouth in a puff of sweltering heat and he smiles back, narrowed eyes revealing that he can’t be deceived that easily but is willing to indulge her. “I’m not ungrateful,” she says and, despite everything, means it.

“No, you’re only human,” he retorts kindly. “And you’re already drying up. You will die if we don’t speed things up a bit.”

“So, where is he?”

“Do you want to see?” the god of Death asks.

Karen thinks about the horrible things she’s seen down here, then Frank, his soul trapped in never-ending misery, even death denying him the peace he was deprived of while he was alive, and she realizes there is no justice in any world, any plane of existence. What are they doing to him? It must be pretty bad, if he has to ask before showing her. He probably thinks she will run away screaming, doesn’t believe she can take it.

“Yes,” she breathes. “And while we’re at it, I want you to put on a different face too.”

He looks at her with a small questioning grin and snaps his fingers.  

The void collapses within itself and just as she’s about to brace for the fall, Karen finds herself standing in a windowless office, bookcases covering the walls from the floor to the ceiling, a lamp buzzing and flickering its light over a glass desk. The only item on it is a monitor, not plugged into anything, as if it could operate on the power of thought alone. “Very modern.”

“Designed for your comfort,” he tells her with Ellison’s snappy but affectionate voice and when she looks at him, she finds Ellison staring back. “Is this better?”

“Not really, but I’ll take it.”

“Then let’s proceed,” he says, gesturing to the desk and Karen approaches it cautiously, taking a seat as she prepares for what’s to come. The screen of the monitor is ominously black, reflecting her face back to her. She smooths her hair out of her face, redoes her ponytail; she can’t do anything about the cuts and tears on her skin, but she looks a bit less like a scarecrow now. The screen flashes to life. _Finally, there you are._

Frank is in a bed- his bed, his and Maria’s- and the light coming in through the window falls on his face, touching features so soft that it hurts. It hurts to see how different he was back then, to know he’s never going to be like that again. He seems confused for a moment, doesn’t know exactly where he is but as his wife smiles, his confusion settles into comfort. He rubs her arm, playfully pokes her knee. He looks happy. That was where he belonged, his place in the world and Karen has come all this way to snag him out of it. What if Wesley was right? She contemplates leaving the underworld alone, let him have this. _It’s what he wants, it’s what he—_

Music trickles into the room and her heart slows, and if he knew what’s coming, so would his. “Where are the babies?” whispers Frank as the sunlight fades out and makes way for the carousel lights, blinking in the deep darkness of the new scene. She isn’t sure what’s happening at first, which part of his story she’s witnessing, until she sees Frank’s figure, a slumped heap of flesh and bones over his daughter’s body, trying to put back together what has been thoroughly shattered, while his wife and son bleed out on the ground next to him. With Lisa’s blood soaking his clothes, he utters a low howl of pain, a cry Karen recognizes. And she wants to reach out, take him by the hand and tell him to come away, that it’s over, but it would be a lie, because this isn’t the first time he’s had this nightmare. And it certainly isn’t the first time they’ve put him through it.

“This isn’t my doing,” her companion tells her, putting his palms up.

“I don’t see you stopping it,” she spits.

“I can’t.”

 _I could_. Even though her hands are shaking, she could tear his whole realm apart, just to pull one man out of it.

“Everybody chooses their own torment down here,” he explains. “You did too.”

She doesn’t have time to deal with him. A last look at his family and Frank is leaning towards the barrel of the gun pointed at his head, begging without words to be given death, since he can’t plead for their lives, can’t save them. Karen knows she’s not screaming, but a scream rings in her ears regardless, as the shot reverberates in echo after echo after echo and—

The oscillation of the explosion makes him stumble backwards, but he pushes past the kitchen door, limping even more heavily now that all hope is lost. The dust makes it difficult to distinguish who the chunks of meat scattered all over the place belong to, but he tries anyway, like body parts are pieces of a puzzle that can be rebuilt a thousand times.

“That’s not… not what happened.”

“What can I say? The man loves his guilt,” Ellison chuckles. “But you knew that.”

Her jaw clenches, granules of dust crunching between her teeth as though she’s in that kitchen, _still_ in that kitchen with him, reaching for the white wire.

Frank notices a scrap of fabric by his foot and kneels down to get it. Soft blue, punctuated by an embroidery of gore. His breath buckles under her name. He stays there, on his knees, wobbling from side to side, waiting to either get arrested or be shot on sight. Karen knows which one he’s wishing for. The image fades out before the urge to touch the screen overpowers her.

And there he is again, tied to a chair, taking punches like he’s earned them, while Russo recounts all the ways in which he has failed as a husband and father, as a soldier, as a person. It would hurt anyway, but coming from Billy, it must be grueling. Frank nods and the speech drags on and on and it’s too much, too much to take sitting down behind a desk, fingernails digging into her palms to keep that scream from rippling out of her throat.

“You want it to stop, right, Frankie?” Russo asks with a smile that could be mistaken for generosity.

“Yeah, do it, Bill,” Frank tells him. “Make it stop.”

“I’d love to, but I think someone else will have that privilege,” he smirks and out of the shadows, like she’s been a part of them all along and only now has decided to materialize, steps Karen, _a Karen,_ who looks so much like the real thing that Karen herself has to wonder if she’s still sitting in her chair. She throws a wild glance at the Ellison.

“Remember, it’s his choice,” he says.

_Why?_

“Hey, Karen,” Frank’s voice melts, his body thawing as her thumb strokes his cheekbone. He’s looking at her the same way he looked at Maria before, except his eyes are swollen and bruised. Somehow, his lip finds the strength to curl into a tiny smile.

“Hi, Frank,” she smiles back at him, just as Billy puts a gun in her hand.

His eyes snap from her face to the gun and back again, but his expression doesn’t change. She’s an angel of mercy to him, coming to save him from the pain. In life, she did it by loving him. In death, she seems willing to consider a different path. And Frank believes this will end all of his suffering. If he knew it would never end, would he still be abandoning himself to the kindness of a bullet? “It’s okay,” he says, thinking this semblance of her feels the same way about shooting him that the real Karen does. “You’ll be the last thing I see. That’s good, huh? Yeah, I like that.”

Karen grabs the monitor with both hands, hears it cracking, hears her heart cracking, the thread of the world –the real one or the forged one?- tearing.

The fake Karen sighs dramatically, the smile never leaving her lips as she raises the gun to his head. “I wouldn’t want to leave you here like this, Frank. Even if it’s what you deserve.”

_No. No, it isn’t. He doesn’t deserve this hell._

“I know, I know,” Frank whimpers and hangs his head. He makes no more sound, but she sees his shoulders shaking and knows he’s weeping. Her double could have shot him when he was smiling, still warm with the thought of charity, but she chooses this moment to dig the gun into his forehead, snaring him in guilt and agony, as she pushes his head back to have a look at the forlorn face contorting, and squeezes the trigger. Karen jumps out of her chair. _It’s over_.

And then it starts from the beginning. The sunlight, the carousel music, the horror. His very own endless loop of torment. Karen rips the monitor from its spot and throws it at Ellison. It goes right through him and crashes against the bookcase behind him, splitting into tiny glowing fragments that dissolve before they hit the floor. “Enough,” she screeches. “He’s had enough, do you hear me?”

Ellison quirks an eyebrow, taps his lips with his finger. He’s always found humans enthralling. If her humanity wasn’t shining so brightly, he might have mistaken her for one of the Erinyes. Karen crosses her arms on her chest when he smirks. The fact that she hasn’t the slightest idea how to compete against a god won’t stop her. The underworld can try to deny her what she fought so hard for, but if they think she’s done fighting, they’re in for a surprise. _I’m not leaving without Frank._

“Okay,” says the god of Death.                             

“Okay?”

“Have you ever worked at a job you hated?” he asks with a sigh.

“You’re kidding, right?” He must be.

“Karen, words cannot explain how much I hate my job,” he laughs, if a little bitterly. “Imagine having to do what I do for thousands of years. No sick days, no time off. It… it takes its toll.”

“You could always-”

“Quit? I have tried. I am not allowed to quit. So I do what I must and people hate me and I tell myself I’m above it all. And then…” He waves his hand at her and she takes a small, hesitant step back. His mouth pouts slightly. “This Frank Castle means nothing to me. He is but a grain of sand among billions,” he says, “but your ephemeral, mortal heart wouldn’t have led you this far if he wasn’t important to you.” He pauses, taps her sternum with a curved knuckle. It makes a strangely hollow sound. “And you were nice to my dog, so I’m inclined to consider your plea. Your Frank is trapped. In our illusion, yes, but in his own mind as well. If you can get him out, he’s all yours.”

“That’s it? You won’t have me do anything… impossible?” As if she hasn’t done enough impossible things already.

“That’s it.” He sighs and runs a cold palm over her cheek. “As much as I’d like to keep you here…”

Her skin crawls at his touch, the muscles of her face hurting as she tries to keep her smile from faltering. “Well, you’ll get me eventually.”

“Oh, I don’t think I will, Karen,” he tells her, lips twitching with a grimace split between sorrow and contentment. “This isn’t the place for you.”

 

 

 

 

Frank remembers everything.

Not all the time. Not when remembering could have saved him some serious heartache- that would be too kind. In between, he remembers what is real and what isn’t and—

Maria’s perfume sprinkled on the sheets, smelling different. Not as flowery as he dreamed all those long nights on deployment. She’s leaning over him on the bed, her whispers like music to his ears as he reaches for her arm, treasuring the feel of her skin under his palm. Before he knows it, he’s smiling and Maria is smiling to him, for him- how the hell did he go so long without her? He doesn’t want this to end. Something’s off though. The moment feels fragile, like it could fall apart anytime, already crumbling somehow. It’s him, he knows it’s him, never fitting in. It will take time to adjust. He just has to give it time and maybe, eventually, he won’t be the odd one out and his wife won’t be flinching at his every move and…

“Is something wrong?” Maria asks, fidgeting.

Maybe, eventually. Frank shakes his head and strokes her hair. Not today.

At the edge of his hearing, a dissonant tune begins to swell. A glimmer of gold twinkling out of nowhere makes his breath hitch. Because he remembers, in some way, even though he has forgotten.

“You can tell me if…”

“Just my eyes playing tricks on me, that’s all.” Just the bleak yellow of the desert stuck behind his eyelids, he reasons. Nothing more. Maria tips her head down to his to place a delicate peck on his nose. Frank rubs his eyes. The kids. He wants to see the kids. One look at them should be enough. Not for them. For him, to keep him on his feet for the rest of the day, for the rest of his life. One look at their faces before—“Where are the babies?” Now, he has to see them now.

Feels like they’re running out of time.

 _The monster’s coming_. This isn’t something you forget.

 _Should’ve heard it, should’ve done something, something, should’ve…_ Frankie’s trying to act all brave when he should be crying. Why, his eyes are asking. Why, why, why? _I don’t know._ Maria’s already gone, all light in her eyes extinguished. Maybe that’s good. She doesn’t have to see this, Frankie, _my little boy_ , like this, Lisa, _my flower, my beautiful flower_ , her face a bleeding rose—who would do this? Why? _I don’t know._ What was the point of fighting, if not to keep them safe? _I don’t know._

There’s a voice telling him it wasn’t his fault, that he can’t keep doing this to himself.

He just watched his family get gunned down in front of his eyes. Can’t keep doing this? Their bodies are still warm, for crying out loud. They’re still… He’s angry. Angry at the people who did this, angry at the offering of comfort the voice brings along with it. Just so goddamn angry. _I can’t, what? Cry for my family? My babies - my babies are…_ He’s all out of breath. Isn’t it too soon to let go of his grief? _It’s been long enough_. It’s too soon.

A spark swirls in the back of his mind, pushing against the darkness. Light doesn’t belong here. What does it matter that he wants to break open for it, shatter and dissipate and then be made whole again? She’s not supposed to… _Out of place._ She’s what comes—

 _Not yet._ He remembers that much.

The spark persists, stronger, more vibrant than before. It’s going to split his head open. The carousel lights glare and the music is too loud and the bodies are splayed out on the grass like dry branches, empty of blood, empty of life, just… empty, already fading, returning to the earth, dust to dust. A sniper comes out of nowhere, pointing a gun at him. He should finish it, before the spark gets its way. He climbs to his feet and it feels exactly like that, a climb, every bone in his body aching.

The sniper halts, gun at the ready and Frank leans forward, pressing his forehead to the barrel. That’s how it always ends.

_I don’t want to._

The bullet doesn’t really hurt as it sears its way into his skull. He remembers then, Karen waking up, her hair sliding across the pillow as she turned to look at him. He will soon forget, but he remembers now and he almost wishes he didn’t, because when the bullet rips past his hippocampus, it will all be gone.

 _I lost her_. The oscillation of the explosion makes him stumble backwards, but he pushes past the kitchen door anyway, to face his failure. He’s always too late, too slow when it matters most. There’s so much dust, curling in on itself, mercifully obscuring the pulp of meat dribbling down the walls. How much of it is hers? A flicker of blue fabric appears by his boot and he bends down to get it. He rubs it between his fingers, spreading her blood over the surface that hasn’t soaked it greedily. There’s not enough oxygen in the world. The room starts feeling smaller, the walls closing in like some kind of ancient trap.

He opens his mouth to mumble something, _Karen_ suddenly a heavy word, and he remembers again, his lungs hurting as they filled with blood, and her name—her name drowning in the swamp his chest had become, taking with it the foolish hope of seeing her again before he died. _I lost her_. A rumble of angry voices is growing in the background and he knows he should probably be angry too, but there’s nothing left in him capable of feeling anger, of feeling anything. _I’m lost_.

“They’re all dead because of you.”

The cable ties are beginning to cut into his wrists and it stings. His whole face hurts and the words have a dagger-like quality too, but God, if the most annoying thing isn’t Russo’s voice. He can’t concentrate with all that yapping, can’t remember the forgotten things. “Bill,” he sputters, along with some blood. “Shut your goddamn mouth.”

Billy doesn’t flinch; if he’s surprised that Frank has suddenly decided to talk back, it doesn’t show on his face. “Have you had enough, Frankie? Do you want it to stop?” He shifts the gun from one hand to the other, pulls back the safety, more for effect than anything else.

That isn’t usually her cue, but Karen steps out of the shadows with a vicious grin on her lips, a large bruise under her eye, scratches scattered all over her face and a blistering patch of skin across her forearm. And that’s only what he can glean from a quick once over. “Hey, Karen?” Frank tries to draw her attention but she doesn’t even look at him.

“Is that for me?” she says and Billy nods, polite and charming, handing the gun over to her. “Thanks,” she huffs, aims between his eyes and pulls the trigger without even blinking, like it’s nothing. Billy drops like an empty sack— maybe that’s all he really was.

Frank’s eyes follow her as she removes the mag and tosses it to the side.

“Can’t risk you getting shot by accident and having to start over again. I don’t know about you, but I can’t take any more of those horrible loops,” she explains, already scouring every surface in the room for anything that can cut through his bonds.

The moment she finishes her sentence, the room starts feeling smaller, the walls closing in like some kind of ancient trap. “What?” Shouldn’t he know the answer already? He can feel it scratching at the back of his brain.

Having found nothing of use, she begins pacing up and down, one hand curled around her throat while the other twitches nervously on her hip. “We have to get out of here.”

“Karen, are you okay?”

She nods to the floor. “I just need to think.”

He can hear the desperation growing in her voice. “Karen…” he growls.

“It’s okay.” Her harsh chuckle is even more distressing. “I’m okay, look at me.”

That’s the thing though. He keeps looking and looking and not once does she meet his eyes. Karen, who would stare him down until he felt weak in the knees. That alone is enough to make his eyes water. “Let me.”

She takes a few more steps back and forth before finally coming to a standstill and slowly, almost shyly, raises her gaze to him. Through all the tough shit they’ve been, she has never looked this haunted. “What the…” he can’t keep his voice from cracking. “What happened to you?” She seems ready to topple over any minute now and Frank wants nothing more than to scoop her up and get her somewhere safe, but he can’t do any of that with his hands tied. He curses and tries to twist his wrists but those ties are fastened too goddamn tight.

“Hurting yourself even more isn’t going to help,” Karen chastises him.

“Don’t suppose you have clippers on you,” he makes a sound that is supposed to pass for a laugh.

“Just the clothes on my back,” she replies with an equally unamused tone.

“Not even your gun?”

“Apparently, the underworld has very strict gun control.” She lets out a long, trembling breath. “What use would it be anyway? Everything here is already dead. Everything except…” she trails off.

Frank remembers Karen not being the sort that would make such wild shit up. The underworld, the afterlife, an actual destination and not a story to scare people with. Sure, okay, he can buy that. If the sky can rain down aliens, then why shouldn’t the underworld be real too? It takes the concept less time to settle in his mind than he would have liked, but the thing is that it does, so the most logical question to ask then would be—“Except us?” She takes a second too long to answer ‘no’ because, God, he can see in her eyes how badly she wishes she could say yes.

And he’s fine with that, really, it doesn’t even faze him. At some point in his life, he might have been afraid of dying. You deal in death as long as he has though, how shocked can you be when it catches up to you?  But she’s a whole other deal. He swallows hard because he can hardly swallow. “You?” The last bright spot in a dark world, the last person he ever…

“I’m okay,” she says again, softer this time, reassuring. “Frank…”

Grateful as he is, he doesn’t allow her time to speak. “If I’m dead and you’re alive, that means one of us shouldn’t be here.”

All the softness is gone from her in an instant and he doesn’t give a damn about how pissed off she is, because the thought of her willingly walking into hell to save him scares him more than her wrath. They glare at each other for what feels like ages, for what feels like time they don’t have.

He breaks the silence first. “How many times? How many times have I told you-”

“Spare me the lecture…”

“-to look out for yourself, Karen? I don’t need you trying to save me!”

“You obviously do!”

“Somebody dies, you sit back and grieve and move on with your life! You don’t put yourself through-”

“You’re seriously going to tell me I should move on?”

“-whatever shit you’ve gone through to bring me back! Yeah, I-”

“You, of all people?”

“-get to tell you that!”

“You don’t get to tell me that!”

Why is he inhaling so deeply if he doesn’t need to breathe? Force of habit, he guesses. “Karen, listen…”

She takes a deep breath too, her palm up asking for a cease-fire. Then she surges forward, grinding her teeth together and he thinks she’s going to hit him now, for sure. “Frank…” She bends down, leans in so close he can feel her sigh on his lips, touching her forehead to his, so tender and fragile that the marrow of his bones aches, and she says “Cut the crap, will you?” He can’t help but snort a little laugh. “We have a deal, you and me, and you’re mistaken if you think I’m going to let you off the hook just because you…” She straightens up, tries not to cry, for his sake. “You promised me, Frank. Remember?”

He doesn’t remember yet. But he wants to. The spark that has been dancing in his mind all this time threatens to flood everything in light.

“What did I promise you?” Blood is still dripping from his mouth like there’s an endless supply of the damn thing. He should have run out by now. Better run out than drown her in it. “Last time I saw you-”

“Last time you saw me you said the ventilation in the bathroom wasn’t working again. You said you’d take a look at it when you came back. Didn’t want the ceiling to get moldy,” she sniffles and he listens with a creased brow. “You said mold is a bitch.”

Those would be his last words to her. Nothing solid like ‘I love you’, nothing she could take to bed at night as she cried in her pillow, let that be her consolation. He nods and looks away. He could never have imagined that a conversation about mold would be making his heart beat out of his chest. “Damn spores getting everywhere. You’d have to scrape and bleach and paint, over and over. That ain’t fun.”

“I can’t have mold on the ceiling, Frank.”

She’s giving him that look again, the one that makes his knees rubbery and the silence heavy with all the things he hasn’t told her. Or maybe he has- he can’t remember what he has told her in that apartment they shared where he was in charge of repairing stuff. Where he fit in, all because she gave him that. He must have given her something too, good enough to warrant her taking up this batshit quest of saving him. How could he have made anything good out of the fucked up mess of his life? “Yeah, I don’t want you to have mold on the ceiling either.”

“Then get yourself out of the goddamn chair,” she startles him when she raises her voice, startles him even more when she kicks the spindle and nearly drops him on his side.

Before he can defend himself, _my hands are literally tied_ , the walls suddenly decide to evaporate in a coppery shimmer, the room blurring out of his vision.

And then Frank really remembers everything. It breaks him in a different way than he’s ever been broken but this time, this time’s different, because there’s Karen to help him pick up the pieces, even if asking her to do that is inexcusable.

There’s Karen, the papery texture of her skin driving him to a new kind of madness. He has to get her out of here, before she withers and fades, but he can’t move a single muscle. If he still had access to his voice, he’d tell her to run, to get away from that… thing, that hulking figure bobbing in front of her as she jabs a forefinger in what he assumes must be its chest. Isn’t she terrified? “You said all I had to do was get him out,” she yells and Frank’s soul shudders, because his body seems unable to do so.

The creature stares at her with rows and rows of eyes, its expression unreadable since those eyes are the only feature on its primordial face. It doesn’t even have a mouth from where its almost disembodied voice comes out friendly and compassionate. “You did and now you can go, both of you. There’s no trickery involved.”

“But I can’t so much as glance in his direction as we go or you’ll take him back? Who comes up with these rules?”

“You’re welcome to take any and all complaints to my superiors,” it says, a small laugh pulsing through its body.

 _Christ, don’t challenge her or we’ll never get out of here_. The thing briefly turns to him like it can hear his thoughts and he freezes right down to his core. There’s something about having a dark mass peering at him that awakens all sorts of fears he never even knew he had, but he can’t let that shake him. Karen is alive. He needs to make sure she stays that way. _Please_ …

 _“You mortals are funny things,”_ it whispers straight into his mind, its voice bouncing around the walls of his skull. _“Always longing for the lost.”_

_Karen isn’t lost._

_“Only barely.”_

His thoughts are in such disarray that even he couldn’t follow them, but maybe the monster can. _Let me take her home, let me…_ He has nothing to bargain with, not even his life. Far ahead in the distance, a light flickers at the end of a tunnel.

_I’ll take care of her, I’ll do anything, anything, please._

“Are you ready to go, Karen?”

 _Please, please, please, please_ —

Karen turns her back to him with a sigh and takes a step towards the light. As if he’s somehow linked to her, he feels his foot lift and move forward. Then as she pauses, so does he. “Ready as I’ll ever be,” she says.

A smoky tendril protrudes from the monster’s form, tangling in a strand of her hair. “I hope to never see you again,” it tells her and if Frank could move, he’d be trying to tear that appendage off it, away from her, throw it to the ground and stomp on it. “Relax, Frank,” it addresses him again, out loud. “Nobody’s trying to steal your girlfriend.” Karen’s shoulders start shaking and he can’t tell if she’s laughing or crying; the sound coils enough to be either.

Then she starts walking at a steady if a little rickety pace, leaving that dreadful place behind once and for all, that weird link between them forcing him to follow. _I don’t leave you, you don’t leave me_. Sounds like a deal alright.

 

“Frank?”

Nothing. Absolutely no sound. She thinks she hears his footsteps when she’s moving, but each time she stops, she’s confronted by a mocking silence. Why did she ever trust that god? For all she knows, he’s sent her off on her own and that shadowy version of Frank, made out of cobwebs and dust, is still down there, being marched straight back to the torture chambers of hell. All for nothing.

“Frank, I…” _Keep walking, no matter what, just keep walking_. The light is still so far away. “Since you’ve been gone, I’ve just been so tired.” Can he even hear her? “It felt like this exhaustion would never end. I couldn’t even sleep.” She could just sneak a glimpse behind her, couldn’t she? Just to make sure he’s there? _Keep walking._ She just has to make it outside, into the light. “I could sleep when you slept next to me, that’s all I keep thinking about. Well, that and eating the most greasy, fatty, carb loaded burger I can find,” she chuckles. “And water. I miss water.” Her throat tightens at the thought.

A cold draft brushes her neck, soft as a breath. It takes all she has not to turn around then. “We’ll be able to sleep when this is over,” she smiles to herself, thinking about Frank’s arm wrapped around her waist. She stops, takes in the consistent lack of sound before going further. “And you’ll let me hog the pillows.”

She doesn’t say another word after that. Talking to herself is ridiculous and she should spend more energy concentrating on her feet, which are getting more and more unstable. She can’t help but think of the dripping sound that accompanied her on the way in with the slightest hint of sentimentality, even if it was produced by a huge three-headed dog. Nobody would believe her if she told and that’s fine, because she doesn’t plan on telling anybody. She’s gotten enough flack for dating the Punisher, her friends don’t need any more fuel for their judgment. _As long as this works, as long as I walk out of here with him, nothing else matters_. And she soldiers on.

Aren’t gods supposed to be deceitful? Don’t they take pleasure in human suffering? He lied to her, he lied to her and she fell for it and she left Frank behind, after all the promises that she wouldn’t. God, if she could only look…

“Are you there?” Karen feels stupid, stupid, stupid asking this but as the light widens in front of her, pulsing with the same kind of energy Wanda’s portal did, she simply has to. What if he isn’t? What if she’s about to exit the underworld to find herself alone among the living? _Please, be there. Please, be there_. She shuts her eyes tight and takes the most tentative step of her life out into—

 

Bethesda Terrace, sometime after noon

“So what happened?”

“I see this woman, right? And she’s a fucking mess-”

“Sir, I’m going to have to ask you to continue without the expletives.”

“Yes, I’m sorry, officer. It’s just that she looked wild, you know? Covered head to toe in dirt, her clothes were ripped in places, like she’d tumbled through thorns or something and her hair…” The man gestures an invisible cloud above his head.

“Blonde, you said?”

“Yeah, yeah, blonde and the guy had dark hair. Dark brown, I think. I see her walking past me, at first I think huh, just another weirdo, no big deal. This city is full of them. She walks straight to the fountain and splashes water on her face and, it’s cold out here today, even if the water wasn’t filthy I’d think, what the f-” The policeman glares at him. “I’d think what’s wrong with her, right? I wouldn’t dip my pinky in that water. Then the guy runs after her and he says ‘Please, don’t drink that’ and I think, yeah, my dude, don’t let her drink that. Can’t be healthy.”

“You said there was an attack.”

“Right after that. ‘Don’t drink that’ and then she punches him, right in the chest, she punched him and he was big, you know, tough looking and she seemed weak at that point, like she was going to faint. But she punches him and he doesn’t do anything, he’s just taking it and she says… Something about dying. I didn’t hear that part clearly, because there’s lots of people here, some voices get lost and she wasn’t yelling yet. Something, something, dying, something and she punches him again, on the arm.”

“Did he retaliate?”

“No, he was standing there, nodding. He was very calm, wiping water off her face while she’s railing against him. I felt sorry for the guy, okay? That’s when I went over and told her, look, just because he’s a man doesn’t mean you can treat him this way. This is abuse, what you’re doing. You can’t do that. And she. Went. Crazy. She jumped straight at me, she had her fingers curled into a goddamn…” He clears his throat. “Curled into a claw and she would have scratched my eyes out, I’m sure, if he wasn’t holding her back. She yelled ‘Do you want a piece of me too?’ Made my blood go cold. Her eyes, wild, her pupils were so tiny. And this guy, he rubs her shoulder and tells me ‘I’m good, buddy, don’t worry’ and I start walking backwards, don’t want her getting a chance to grab me, you know, and she turns to him, all squeaky, ‘I’m going to kill you myself next time, I’m going to kill you myself, I’m going to kill you myself!’ and he’s still nodding to her, he’s saying ‘I promise, I promise’. And that’s when I ran to get you guys.”

“And now they’re gone.”

“I can’t see them anywhere.”

“Alright, sir. We’ve got the descriptions, we’ll look into it.”

The two police officers watch the man walk away and disappear into the crowd. The one taking notes turns to his partner with a sigh. “Can we at least get a cup of coffee before writing the report?”

“Sure, why hurry? Daredevil or one of them vigilantes can handle a couple of junkies having a spat.”

They never file the report.

 

 

While Frank runs her a bath, Karen holds on to his hand, unwilling to let go for even a second. The goop he made her to eat is still undecided on whether it’s going to stay in her stomach or eject itself violently out of it. Holding his hand might be the one thing tempering her nausea. Only after he closes the faucet and starts removing her clothes does she loosen her fingers, but that’s only because he’s touching her now and she can feel him, warm and pulsing with life. He has lowered her gently into the tub when she gets her hands on him again. “It will take a bit of squeezing, but we can both fit in here.”

Without a word, Frank strips down too and gets in, pulling her back against his chest, where she finally relaxes, neck-deep in suds, her whole body melting into his. It’s less of a squeeze than she thought, in fact it’s much more comfortable than when she was alone in there, his knees just enough pressure on her thighs to keep her from unravelling.

“You’re crazy, you know that?” he groans.

“A lot of people seem to think so,” she laughs. It feels like a long forgotten habit, laughing. She’s glad to have it make a comeback. She presses her face into his arm, watches the little hairs there stand at her exhale. “Does the Punisher like his women crazy?”

A hoarse chuckle rumbles in his chest and she feels it ripple down her body like a wave. “Who knows? All I can tell you is I like my woman in one piece.”

“I’m not the one who went off and died.” Her fingers dig into his bicep. It would be better if it were her teeth, that would teach him a lesson, but she can’t find the strength to unclench her jaw at the moment.

“Won’t happen again,” Frank soothes her, wrapping an arm around her and holding her as close as he can. This is how it should be, always. “Enough excitement for one lifetime, yeah?”

“Technically, it’s your second,” Karen corrects him with a sigh and leans back, resting her head on his shoulder as his lips brush her temple. “Will you look at that,” she mumbles, slightly amused with the patch of mold that has begun forming on one of the ceiling’s corners.

He follows her gaze and tenses up a bit. “I’ll take care of it.”

“Either that or we move,” she laughs again, enjoying how the sound fizzes across her ribcage. He must be enjoying it too because his fingers trace its rhythm on her skin.

“Where do you wanna go?”

“Florida seems nice,” Karen tells him. “Although it has considerably more sand than New York.”

“I can cope,” Frank says, low in her ear.

He washes her hair, then brushes the knots out of it very carefully. He doesn’t hurt her once. Even though the water is cold by the time they finish, she can’t remember when was the last time that she felt so warm, so loved and so safe, as he wraps her in a towel and dries her up. He gets a bit anxious when he fails in his search for antibiotic cream and has to substitute it with one of Karen’s generic moisturizing lotions. These blisters need heavy-duty stuff, he says, his anger quiet and restrained, and she nods but doesn’t care. When it comes to pain, she’s had worse. This is nothing. This will heal and it won’t even leave a scar.

He takes all the pillows and arranges them in a cozy lump on her side of the bed, where she’s really happy to dive. They don’t have the softest mattress in the world, but after the hardship of the past few days, it feels like she’s lying in a cloud. Especially with Frank lying beside her.

“I’m gonna need you to start making selfish choices from now on,” he tells her. To his credit, it doesn’t sound at all like scolding.

“Sure.” To demonstrate how serious she is, she pulls his hand over her stomach, tucking it under her waist, not giving a damn if this position is comfortable for him. Well, she knows it is, but she still wouldn’t give a damn if it wasn’t. That’s selfish enough, isn’t it?

“You’re never doing anything like that again, okay?” he insists.

Despite all the windows being closed to keep the chill out, a small butterfly finds its way into their bedroom and lands on Karen’s arm. Watching it crawl towards her elbow, she mutters an absent-minded “uh-huh”.

“Promise me.” His grip on her tightens.

“If you can refrain from dying, I’ll have no reason to do something like that again.”

Frank thinks it over for a while before venturing a smile. “Old age sound good?”

With his breath tickling her ear, Karen’s lips turn up too. “It sounds perfect,” she says, lifting her arm in the air so the butterfly can continue on its path without fear of being squashed.

“When did you turn into the butterfly whisperer?” he finally notices.

“I don’t know.” She brings her hand closer to stare right at the insect now perched on the tip of her thumb. Its wings have a serene, red glow to them. “Oh…”

“What?”

“Isn’t it pretty?” she asks. Her voice sounds faraway to her own ears, almost like she’s in a daze.

They’ve both been fairly well acquainted with some of the worst this world and the next have to offer. But there’s a butterfly shaped out of red smoke in the room now, delicately fluttering its wings. Somewhere, there are mermaids. There are happy endings.

“Yeah, it’s real pretty,” says Frank, his eyes firm on her face.


End file.
